A.P. Moller Looks To Resume North Sea Oil Production

Thursday, May 31, 2001

Danish oil and shipping conglomerate A.P. Moeller hopes to resume some of its 120,000 bpd North Sea oil production, which was halted 11 days ago due to a gas explosion, the Danish Energy Agency said on Thursday.

"There are considerations about resuming some of the production this weekend. We are thinking about it and will meet with Maersk on Friday," an agency spokesman said.

The gas explosion occurred on May 20 on the Gorm Field, where production was halted immediately as well as on its four satellite fields Halfdan, Skjold, Rolf and Dagmar.

In all, the five fields produced 120,700 bpd in April or 40 percent of Danish Underground Consortium`s (DUC) total production of 302,200 bpd.

The cause of the explosion was likely corrosion in the pipeline caused by injection of scavenger, a product preventing gas turning sour, Maersk said in a report, the spokesman said.

"We will try to resume production as soon as possible particularly in the Halfdan Field," said a Moller spokesman, who declined to give any specific date.